The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde
by Robert Louis Stevenson
horror / science fiction
copyright 1886
read in March 2013
rated 7 / 10: well worth reading
It's rather difficult to review a book where the "surprise twist" is so well known... Yes, I have finally read the original Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde!
It is also difficult to rate such an old book for modern readers. Okay, it's a classic, so full marks as a classic work of fiction... But I review on enjoyment. Specifically, on my own enjoyment.
And I did enjoy this book.
Compared to modern horror, it's a bit slow. The final body count is just two, where one body is "the monster". I recently reviewed a recent fantasy book where the body count was in the thousands, including quite a few named characters.
If is also difficult to appreciate the mood and mystery which is evoked by the author... We are in London, with its dark streets, thick fog, streets which are deserted after dark -- because that is the London of the author's time.
The central theme of this book -- that we may be composed of two separate elements, one good, one evil -- is as relevant today as it was then. Stevenson even suggests what is now accepted, that one person may contain a large number of separate personalities.
The way that the theme is presented, is old. Even the style of the book's title is old!
A contemporary reader would have appreciated the dark mood of the city streets, the isolation of one household from the next. I read the book as a mild horror story -- and as an insight into life in the late nineteenth century.
Okay, life may have been exaggerated -- that's what an author does! The insights are still valid though the facts may be fictional...
This book is well worth reading. It offers mild horror in -- to us -- a different world. The science of the science fiction is more psychological than physical. To most of us, there is no surprise in the dénouement.
It is just a great pleasure to finally read such a well-known classic. And an extra pleasure to find that it is both easy to read -- and quite enjoyable.
Oh, and you can download the book for free, from www.gutenberg.net
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